Bithumb Freeze Operations and Send everything To Cold Storage after $30 Million Was Stolen in Hack!

Over $30 Million in altcoins has been stolen after one of the largest cryptocurrency exchanges in the world, Bithumb was hacked today (Wednesday 10th June 2018.)

In an effort to prevent any further thefts, the Bithumb team are moving all users assets into offline cold storage.

The exchange has announced they will cover any losses to customers.

[Notice for the suspension of all deposit and withdrawal service]
We checked that some of cryptocurrencies valued about $30,000,000 was stolen. Those stolen cryptocurrencies will be covered from Bithumb and all of assets are being transferring to cold wallet. – Bithumb Official Tweet

The Tweet has now been deleted, but more Tweets have been posted to remind users not to deposit or withdraw funds until further notice.

What has been stolen?

Although it’s unclear so far what the hackers have managed to steal, Coindesk Korea reported that one of the targeted cryptocurrencies was XRP. We’re awaiting further news and updates on any other targeted cryptocurrencies and to get a better feel of the impacts of the hack.

Bithumb exchange hacked

Though nothing official as to how the theft occurred has been announced, the most likely outcome is an online hack. As users assets are stored in online wallets, this makes them vulnerable to potential attacks by online hackers. It comes as a strong reminder to hold cryptocurrency in offline cold storage wherever possible.

Bithumb accounts for around 10% of all cryptocurrency trading volume and is one of Korea’s largest cryptocurrency exchanges.

The impact on the cryptocurrency markets as a whole is not yet clear, but the markets so far have remained relatively stable.

Hacks in the past such as the famous Mt.Gox hack has serious and long lasting effects on the cryptocurrency market because they handled over 70% of all trading at the time.